Never one to sit still the folks at Santa Cruz Bikes have gone and almost done it again. No it's not a sneaky new bike, well it kinda is, and some new bars and even some new grips. Santa Cruz have produced a range of popular models in carbon a grade down from what their bikes are currently made of. It adds a weight gain of between 250-280 grams but combined with specific build kits will drop the price of Santa Cruz complete carbon bikes. How much in New Zealand? Well we just got the prices in on frames, and this new ever so slightly heavier carbon will save you on average $1000 off your new Santa Cruz, for example the new Bronson C frame will cost $3310 and the current Bronson made with premium carbon starts at $4399. For a 280 gram saving that's a significant cost reduction! Its also worth mentioning that despite what the below press release states, here in New Zealand you WILL be able to buy these bikes as frame only options.

For 2015, we’ve managed to dramatically reduce the price on carbon Bronson, 5010 and Tallboy models, and increased our build options to create the kind of industry-crushing performance that now comes as standard from Santa Cruz.

"We're well aware that bikes have been going up in price the last few years” says Joe Graney, who headed-up the project at Santa Cruz. “So we made it a priority to get the radness of our carbon technology to “trickle down" within reach of more riders.”

“Working with our exclusive manufacturing partner, we used the same proprietary processes to create lower cost carbon frames that retained the same legendary strength and stiffness Santa Cruz are known for. We achieved this by using a different grade of carbon material that results in a minimal weight gain of approximately 250-280 grams (0.6 lbs).”

These new carbon frames will only be available as part of the new R and S builds.

The S build represents a whole new tier of performance for Santa Cruz in 2015 and includes components such as the Rockshox Pike RC Solo Air and Reverb Stealth as standard on Bronson or 5010 builds.

We’ve again refrained from conjuring up carbon acronyms to bash you over the head with. The new lower cost frames are simply referred to as “Carbon”, while our existing carbon frames are known as “Carbon C”. Carbon C frames now feature on XT/X01 level builds and up, and remain available as frame only.

Please go to the Bike Builder at the new look SantaCruzBicycles.com to explore all the customizable options of our range.

SANTA CRUZ LAUNCHES NEW RANGE OF CARBON BARS!

On top of releasing six new bikes Santa Cruz have also added four new carbon bars to their stable of in house products. There's and 35mm bar clamp 800mm wide DH riser bar as well as a 760mm version and and for the whuppets and 29er riders out there, Santa Cruz have produced a 31.8 clamped flatat bar that's available in 760mm and 720mm. All the official details are below.

The all new Santa Cruz carbon handlebars are designed and made exclusively by Santa Cruz, using everything we’ve learned from creating World Championship winning carbon bicycles.

“It’s been impossible to keep our engineers away from bars” admits Rob Roskopp, owner of Santa Cruz Bicycles. “Having mastered complex projectssuch as the carbon V10 swingarm, it was inevitable we started looking at where carbon know-how could improve other areas of our products. The key thing for me was that if it was going to carry the Santa Cruz name then everything had to be designed, tested and made by us to the same high standards as our bicycles.”
And so the first Santa Cruz carbon handlebar was born.

Initially conceived for DH, we soon realized the 800mm-wide 35mm-clamp design delivered DH strength at All Mountain weight. So we didn’t stop there, and continued to develop a suite of variants...

Each bar has a dialed amount of stiffness, keeping vibration in check and minimizing arm fatigue. Discrete markers take the pain out of set-up alignments and stealth branding keeps things class.

Exclusively specced on our new 2015 models (from XT/X01 builds upwards) the new carbon bars are bona fide Santa Cruz products that take the quality of our bicycles up yet another notch, and will soon be available after market so you can do the same.

SANTA CRUZ HANDS FIND NEW HOME IN PALMDALE!

Its about now that i realise i could have released this post in three parts... Its to late for that now... So Santa Cruz are making grips now as well! I mean its good logo real estate for sure but do we need another grip option? Well after getting a first look at these chaps i'm thinking yes. I'm a huge fan of the Race Face Half Nelson and this new offering from the Cruz is looking like a more refined version of that... hopefully we can get our mitts on them soon to see if they are as good as they look. As per the res of the post, below is the official word.

The brand new Palmdale Grip is a classic example of a discussion at Santa Cruz getting out of hand.

“What started as a simple question between a few of us about “what makes a good grip?”, quickly blew up into a mass debate” explains Josh Kissner, Product Manager at Santa Cruz Bicycles. “Before we knew it, everyone from Sven Martin (World Cup photographer and ham-fisted product wrecker) to Kiran MacKinnon (our tech guy and ProGRT racer) were wading in with their 2 cents.”

So we created a whole bunch of different designs for people to ride and report back on, and finally drew up the Grip Manifesto:

1. Single lock-ring design with the staying power of dual lock-ring. A taper-lock core uses an internal sleeve that narrows towards the last 38mm (1.5”) of the grip, effectively clamping onto the end of the bar to eliminate twisting.

2. Closed end with flared edge for comfort, feel and security. 8mm (0.3”) of rubber with a subtle mushroom profile on the tip resists scuffing, provides comfort and adds an intuitive feel for the bar end. (We also found it adds a healthy dose of forgiveness when clipping trees on tight trails!)

3. Long grip length and waffle knurl for maximum control. A generous 125mm (4.9”) grip length (excluding lock-ring) allows plenty of room to reposition hands on differing terrain and long rides. The moto-knurl pattern gives just the right balance of feel and grip in all conditions.

Designed and tested by Santa Cruz, the Palmdale Grips are now officially the new home for your hands on all our 2015 bikes. They’ll also be available after- market in a slew of coordinated colors soon too.

And why “Palmdale” exactly? ...you’ll have to ask Josh about that one.